gaming

The following are a list of key findings from my research on parental assessment of video game content appropriateness for their children. You can read the first round of published results here.

There were no parents in the study who were able to definitively name all of the parts of the ESRB Ratings System or all six ratings and over two-thirds did not know what process games went through to get rated. This resulted in the majority of interviewed parents knowing little to nothing about the ratings system even if they claimed they used it.

Interviewed parents had very specific criteria they used to judge video game appropriateness against and once any of those lines were crossed, the game was considered unsuitable. Though violence was a concern for interviewed parents, perceptions of violence were far more nuanced than the ESRB Rating System descriptors were able to convey, thus many had to do further research to properly assess the game and make sense of the content. Sexual content, however, was of a far higher concern than violence even for those interviewed parents who considered themselves very liberal in the types of games they allowed their children to play.

Interviewed parents with special needs children considered the needs of their child and the ability for a game to help him or her as more important than staying within content that was age appropriate.

Based on the interviews, every family’s and child’s needs are different, including children within the same family. Therefore, a single information system, such as the ESRB Ratings System, may never be able to completely fulfill all of a parent’s information needs as they attempt to bridge their knowledge gap. As long as it provides a place to start, that may be all it needs to do.

Relevant to the previous finding, interviewed parents attempted to bridge their knowledge gaps in multiple ways in order to assess game content and make sense of it. These included using the ESRB Ratings System, Internet searches (including specific sites as well as more general results) to find game reviews (both community and professional), game marketing (including websites, packaging, and commercials), and Let’s Plays (video game play-throughs).
Credibility of the gaming information source was very important to interviewed parents. They cited both the source of the documentation as well as the reputation of the reporting source to be important factors in establishing credibility.

Though a few interviewed parents were in favor of a law, most were not. Those in favor cited it as an extra level of protection or as something they thought was already in place. Those not in favor cited issues with enforcement, the inability for laws to really assist them, as well as a general dislike of having the government interfere with their role as parents.

Specific answers to research questions will be published in a separate post.

“Rather than simply forbiddingyoung peopleto listen to certainforms of music,read certainbooks, or seecertainmovies, many families haveabdicated this responsibility tocivic action groups andthe government.Such arelinquishmentofauthorityoverindividualliveshasledtodenunciations ofvariousmedia forms, callsforself-regulation ofindividualmediums, andattemptsto ban completely some sexually explicitspeech.” (791)”Perhaps even more important than therightofAmericans to decide whattheywish to read, see, and hear for themselvesisthe factthat thisgeneration’s purity crusade is diverting national attention away from more important areas. Indeed, many individuals who believe in a government based on popular participation have not yet realizedthatby devoting so much energy to what is essentially the private business of American citizens,theirattention has been successfully diverted from participation in the political and economic planning processesofthenation.” (850)

Interesting that if you consider gaming, specifically violent video games, to be the topic at hand, these conclusions are as relevant today as they were over 20 years ago.

I think gamers would make great politicians. In game we have to be able to communicate, manage our time and resources, understand technology and how to use it, and work well with others. We also do all of this on top of our daily lives as parents, employees, students, and more. And, last but not least – we do it all for FUN!

So congratulations on your new state senate seat, Colleen Lachicz – Orc Rogue. From me, Diana Harrelson – Anthropologist, PhD Student, User Experience Designer, and proud to be a level 86 (working my way up to 90!) Night Elf Druid.

Do you play Farmville or any of the other what seem like thousands of passive games on Facebook? Do you enjoy it? Get something out of it? If so, you probably don’t want to read any further. Head back to your Facebook page and continue to spew your digital litter all over the place and I’ll continue to toss your pixels wasted on your mind numbing updates into the digital recycle bin.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t hold the fact you play the games against you – but please don’t be offended if I do not share in the excitement or even interest of your overzealous updates on your latest point-click-refresh time sink.

Now, I’m just as guilty as the next 4sq’r on your list. Yes, I’ll admit to that. But, you also have to admit you rarely see a 4sq update from me, and when you do it’s someplace really cool and usually with friends. Most of the check ins I never publish to my feeds and if it takes any longer than 30 seconds to check in, I get over it and move on.

That’s just it, the crux of this post, gaming used to be synonymous with having skills. Working for 3DFX, we even used games to compete with one another for special privileges like hosting the booth at Quakecon. I remember the days of Atari (yes I was young, but I played it!); when pizza joints had arcade tables where you could eat and at the same time play Pacman with a friend; the awesomeness of playing against someone in Street Fighter and Mortal Combat at the arcade; beating Super Mario and Paper Boy for the first time on the NES; and even playing games on the now defunct Dreamcast and Sega Saturn.

My first exposure to PC games was Doom, then on to Quake and Unreal Tournament, and I definitely remember enjoying Myst, 7th Guest, and Myth. From there I moved on to Diablo / Diablo II, & Warcraft I/II/III. (Gotta give Blizzard props for having games that came out on PC and Mac at the same time – this is what won me over to them early on.) Can’t forget the original Sims (though it’s been hard for me to get into the latest version and I’ll admit only played Spore a few hours). Hell, I remember playing the first Halo game when it came out and finding it funny that it took Microsoft buying Bungie, who was originally a Macintosh game developer (anyone remember Oni?), to put out a great game.

These days I’m all about Borderlands (via Steam and my ever expanding library of games there), WoW (/played since Nov 23, 2004), as well as games like Little Big Planet, any of the Lego games (Batman, Star Wars, and Harry Potter are my favs so far), and many many others on multiple computers, consoles, and hand held devices.

I don’t mean to spark a debate here over what should and should not be called a game, or even the quality of the games themselves – this is more about the gaming experience and what it means to self identify or earn the title of Gamer. This is by no means the type of academic post most are used to seeing here, it’s more of an opinion piece. My opinion is simple – games should take mental skills, actual effort, quick thinking, consequences of making critical choices, and even some practice.

If you’re playing a game that doesn’t require these things, especially the making you think part, well perhaps you should try them sometime. Then, maybe we can talk gamer to gamer. Until that time, I’ll continue to block your point-click-refresh posts off my Facebook feed and decline every single invitation you send my way. Look me up when you want to waste time with me playing a real game. I promise not to beat you too bad, – the first time.

And there’s also the issue that Google’s pull-out of China might make the overall human rights situation slightly worse. Because whether or not you approve of Google, while it was operating in China it was pushing for relaxations of censorship–using its size as a global giant to try to lever open some cracks in the censorship wall. And if it leaves the country, then what’s to stop the Chinese government running roughshod over any other players in the Internet tech game–likely far smaller ones than mighty Google–and forcing them to comply?

Yep, it happens and has been happening all over the US for some time now. As a matter of fact it’s the third time I’ve been laid off during my career. My first layoff was during the dotcom collapse of 2001 where the company I worked for (3DFX – manufacturers of Voodoo gaming video cards) went out of business and sold their IP to NVidia (and I loved that job!). It took me 6 months to get a job after that and I am still paying off credit card debt accrued during that time.

My second was October of 2007 when I found out that the man who ran the company I worked for failed to pay taxes. He had previously worked for Enron – no joke. Luckily I found a job right away as I had already been scouting for one sensing the end was near.

Then this one was a simple business decision and I can respect that. Still, it hurts both in the pocketbook and to one’s sense of pride. I worked very hard at that job and felt I was doing a lot of good. Sadly, my type of position is usually one of the first to go when a restructuring happens so it’s to be expected. Being previously laid off doesn’t make this time better or worse – it just means I understand that it happens and past experience has told me it is something from which I can recover.

For those World of Warcraft gamers who have never been laid off, it’s much like having your raiding guild up and decide it’s no longer going to raid anymore so you are no longer needed. This actually happened to me over the summer, so yes I can tell you it feels pretty darn similar. These were people I had raided with for almost the entire time the game was out (over four years!), and poof it was gone. What seemed like it happened over night had actually been months in the making, but it still wasn’t any less shocking or hard to take.

What’s cool now is I have a few freelance gigs I’ve picked up on the side – much like PUGing a raid. In game, I did the same and about 3 months after my guild collapsed I found a new home. I’m hoping it doesn’t take me three months to find a new job! I’ll admit I am a little more dedicated to finding a job than I was to finding a new guild, but I’ve heard stories of people being out of work for close to a year. Those who know me know I can’t sit still for long, and the fact it’s been almost two weeks has me already climbing the walls (hence the freelance gigs).

By the way, if you are looking for a UI designer, usability engineer, information architect, web designer, graphic artist, design or cyber anthropologist, or ethnographic researcher I am your girl! You can find my user experience resume here, my research resume here, and my career portfolio here. If this were my armory, I’d say I’m a dual specced hybrid class so I can fit almost any roll. That and I have lots of raiding experience, a high hit rating, a great list of achievements, and a gear score to drool over!